one by one.

-nineteen-

Riley's lips curl up, and she looks into Maya's fiery blue eyes. "Peaches," is all Riley manages to let out, as she tightly pulls Maya into a hug.

"I'm here, Riles," Maya whispers into her ear, running her hand through Riley's tangled brunette hair.

Riley closes her eyes for a few seconds to enjoy Maya's warm embrace, before jumping back from their hug after realizing Lucas had witnessed everything that just happened.

"Lucas, I'm sorry," Riley says shyly with guilt shot through her voice.

"Sorry?" Lucas laughs. "You're alive. That's all I care about right now."

Riley smiles and runs into his arms for a hug.

As they pull apart Lucas asks, "how are you alive?"

"Oh yeah. Well, it all started when Maya shot herself. I picked her body off of the ground and felt something in the back of her neck. Later that day I felt to see if something was in the back of mine, and there was. So obviously the next logical step was to create a rock family," Riley explains.

"Obviously," Lucas sarcastically remarks. "What else would one do?"

"Exactly!" Riley enthusiastically agrees, as she goes to sit by the fire.

Lucas furrows his eyebrows and gives Maya a look to see if she knows where Riley is going with her story. Unfortunately, he is simply answered with a shrug and a just as confused expression from the blonde.

Maya and Lucas follow Riley to the campfire, and the brunette continues her story.

"So I gathered some rocks during day, and that night I cut open the back of my neck," Riley casually says.

"With a rock?" Lucas exclaims.

"Yeah. Weren't you paying attention?" Riley asks.

"I guess not," he replies.

"Gee Lucas, start paying attention," Maya says with a smirk.

"As I was saying, I cut open my neck  and this little metal thing came out of it. I think the people must have put it in all of us before they sent us out here. Then I thought maybe they used it to track, so I decided I needed to figure out a way to get rid of it. And you'll never believe what I ended up doing."

"You pretended to give your rocks bath everyday, so you could practice holding your breath long enough for you to bury the chip in the river and disappear downstream and fake your own death," Maya answers.

Riley gasps in amazement. "Wow Peaches, you're really good at guessing."

"No she's not. We watched the whole thing. Not only did the chip track you, but it also kept a camera on you at all times- well when it was in your body that is," Lucas says.

"Oh," Riley blinks. "Long story short, you guys found me and here we are. So am I allowed to ask how you guys got here?"

"We came to rescue you," Lucas responds.

"Okay, but like how are you alive?" Riley questions.

"The bullets put us into a paralysis, but they never actually killed us. After we were shot they put up the dome and retrieved our bodies and brought us back to their lab," Lucas answers.